Geyserville Wine Country Getaway

A Visit to Geyserville and the Surrounding Wine Country

For our first day of wine tasting we head north to visit two wineries. Just a short hop away is the Geyser Peak Winery. From the Inn, it’s a left on Canyon Road and just after passing under the Freeway a right on Chianti Road. The Geyser Peak Winery has a long history of ownership dating back to 1880. The current owners, Jim Beam Brands, have turned Geyser Peak into a well-respected winery. Today, the winery produces roughly 500,000 cases of wine per year. The wines are excellent and, better yet, reasonably priced. They are many good wines to taste here.

We head back on Chianti and take a right on Canyon Road to Pedroncelli Winery. This winery is actually located just outside the Alexander Valley, in the Dry Creek Valley wine appellation. Pedroncelli is a family-owned winery that began operation in 1927. Our favorite wine of our tasting is the Mother Clone Zinfandel. One of the benefits of being an old family winery is less financial overhead and as a result Pedroncelli has several good wines priced under $15.

Back in town, Geyserville had two tasting rooms, Meeker Vineyard, and Locals. Meeker is a kick with a far different character you will find in most tasting rooms. The tasting room is housed in Geysersville’s 100-year-old bank building, which lends itself to an unusual wine tasting experience. It’s fun place to taste and we like the wines very much.

Just across the way is Locals tasting room. At this tasting room, one can taste wines from five local vintners. There are 52 wines to choose from and the tasting can be done in various ways. It is always fun to try a flight of one varietal from each winery and see how the wines differ.

For dinner, we dine at Taverna Santi. The food here is fabulous. We rate Santi a 4.5 on our Five Point rating scale. Our meals are wonderful and the service superb. It is easy to get the feeling you are in a small Italian town. The pace is slow and easy, with no rush to get us out the door.

Day Two
For breakfast, we eat at the Hoffman House Cafe, next door to the Geyserville Inn. The café is owned and managed by the Geyserville Inn. It is a cozy and warm place and the breakfast faire is excellent. Our server introduces his himself as Ace. Ace is a fantastic resource of local wine information and recommends several wineries. Later, we purchase some wine from one of the local wineries and get a 10% discount when we happen to mention that Ace sent us.

The Hoffman House serves breakfast and lunch. We order a box lunch that will provide us with good eats for our wine country picnic later in the day.

Today, our wine country getaway will take us south on Highway 128 to the heart of the Alexander Valley and to the Robert Young Estate Winery and Field Stone Winery. Within a short distance we pass De Lorimier Winery and Murphy-Goode Estate Winery, both excellent wineries and ones that are worth a visit. Just past Murphy-Goode is Geyser Road. We turn left and look for Red Wine Rd. where the the Robert Young Estate Winery is located. Robert Young is boutique winery, producing three high-quality wines, each in small amounts. They use the very best grapes from their estate vineyards to make an outstanding Chardonnay, a Merlot, and a Bordeaux style blend. The tasting fee is $5 but it worth every penny to taste these great wines.

Find More Information about the Russian River Wine Country